


raindrops.

by luna_e_stelle



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Blankets, Comfort, Fluff, Gen, Green Tea - Freeform, Insomnia, Parent Tony Stark, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Sleepiness, Tony Stark Has A Heart, its one of the best teas don't @ me, literally the most fluff i have and ever will write holy crap
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-29
Updated: 2019-04-29
Packaged: 2020-02-09 20:01:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18645100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luna_e_stelle/pseuds/luna_e_stelle
Summary: "I haven’t slept in three days." He wanted to laugh at himself, really. He knew he was being stupid, and maybe a bit dramatic, but tears were welling in his eyes and his hands were shaking. Tony stared at him for a moment, eyebrows furrowed.And then something in his face softened. "Come here, kid."





	raindrops.

**Author's Note:**

> alternatively titled 'me ignoring endgame for 2000 words' but go off i guess

It started just before May left for Chicago; for volunteer work at a hospital, after a heavy snowstorm. She had kissed him on his forehead, and smiled and said _be good._

"Always," he grinned back, hugged her tight.

"Listen to Tony and Happy. And clean up after dinner. And —"

Peter pulled away slightly and rolled his eyes. "Yes, May — I promise. You’re gonna miss your flight."

She let out a breath, brushed back his hair. "Okay, okay. I love you."

"Love you, too." With that, May was gone.

Peter tugged his sweater over his hands. It was seven-thirty, and the sun had risen, but it was hidden behind dark grey clouds. The world was oddly still, despite the already busy airport, and something icy spiked in his chest. He rolled his shoulders and bit his lip.

"Kid, let’s go." Peter spun to see Happy with his arms crossed, face stoic.

"Uh — Yep, cool." His voice was croaky and bags under his eyes were heavy. He had spent last night getting thrown through windows and tossing in bed until he got up to take May to the airport. "Wanna stop for coffee?"

Happy studied him for a second. "Smartest thing you’ve ever said."

At twenty-past-nine, Peter put his head on his hand and sipped on his ice coffee and watched as raindrops fell against the windows faster and faster. Ned was tapping his pen on the table, the teacher drawing something on the board. It was monotonous, the rain. His jacket was warm and comfortable and everything was dimming, getting quieter.

"Dude." He blinked, jumped a bit when Ned shoved his shoulder lightly. "We gotta do question six and seven."

The sleepiness disappeared. After a while, the tiny font of the textbook started blurring and his scribbled notes stopped making sense, but he kept on going, blinking his heavy eyes and leaning his head on his free hand. It was gonna be a long day.

When he got back to the compound, it was cold. His muscles were stiff and the blankets he held around his shoulders and the layers of old, worn-in shirts he wore really weren’t doing anything. The first thing he did when he dragged himself into the lab was slump in the stool next to Tony and put his head on the table, watching as he worked on some delicate-looking wires.

"Someone kick your dog or something, kid?" He asked, glancing over.

"Tired," Peter mumbled.

"Then go sleep." Tony rolled his eyes when he shook his head.

"I got — stuff to do." He did. He had homework and had to fix his web shooters and wanted to help with some Iron Man stuff.

Tony picked up a pair of tweezers and moved another wire. "You look like a corpse."

"I always do." Peter forced himself to sit up. The blankets fell and he pulled worksheets from his bag.

Tony dragged him up for dinner, eventually. It was quiet, and they both piled on the couch and watched TV. His plate starting going limp in his hand when he had finished and his fork clattered to the ground, and he got sent to bed.

"My web shooters," Peter argued, swatting Tony’s hand away from his hair halfheartedly.

"I’ll have a look at them, kid." Tony herded him into his room. "Jesus — May sends you over here for — what? Two weeks? You’re gonna collapse on the first damn day."

The bed was comfortable. Warm and soft and everything he had been daydreaming about all day. He asked F.R.I.D.A.Y. to turn the lights off and took a few deep breaths, letting sleep wash over him.

It didn’t, though. He laid still for what seemed like hours, days, listening to his breathing and feeling his heartbeat. His skin pricked, just annoying itches that made him huff and kick the sheets around and roll onto his side, trying to stop them. The darkness that had wrapped around him wasn’t even dark anymore, and he knew that his eyes were so much better than normal people's, and he groaned and shoved a pillow against his face.

He made checklist in his head; his homework, his decathlon times, what movies he and Tony could watch on the weekend. He tried to go through the periodic table, tried to think of the craziest web shooter designs possible. Eventually, he gave up, rolled over and scrolled through Instagram and Twitter and put on a quiet playlist he had made a few days before.

At three o’clock, he scrubbed a hand down his face and sat up. The air was cold when he crawled out of bed. Goosebumps trailed up and down his neck, and the tiles of his ensuite were even colder. He didn’t bother turning on the cold faucet at all, and let his skin turn red and water run through his hair and tried to wash away the stubborn insomnia.

At four o’clock, he felt like he was in another fucking dimension; the cold air nipping against his still red, hot skin, hair still dripping water down his t-shirt. He wasn’t even tired anymore.

 

Later, at lunch, he hid in the library.

" _You good, baby?_ " May said, and Peter held the phone tighter. " _You sound tired._ "

"I’m good," he lied. "You sound busy."

She left out a breath. " _So busy. I’m gonna have to go soon._ "

"Have fun with — uh — helping people." May laughed, and he hid a smile as he put his chin on his knees.

" _I will. Love you._ "

"Love you, too," he said and waved at MJ and Ned as they sunk down next to him.

Everything was just a bit too sharp. Light and noise and _everything_ was stinging and cutting. MJ and Ned were mostly quiet, just reading and on their phones, trying to let him sleep, huddled up in a corner, hidden behind rows of books.

The bell rang before he could shut his eyes.

 

"I drink real tea — like a man. None of your herbal shit."

"Mister Stark," Peter said, holding the steaming mug of green tea closer to his chest. "You put like seven spoons of sugar in yours."

Tony took a sip of his own mug and grimaced.

"And besides, you can’t say anything." He had read somewhere that tea had caffeine in it. If it did, Peter guessed he was resigned to the pounding headache that had started in last period and the ache of tiredness behind his eyes. "I’ve seen your smoothies, Mister Stark. I don’t think I eat that many veggies in, like, a whole week."

"You probably should, kid," Tony said, leaning back on the couch. "Growing spider-mutants need lots of nutrients."

Peter hummed and let his head loll back onto the headrest so that he could see out of the windows behind him. The sky was grey with overcast clouds.

"Can I go out tonight — as a spider-mutant?" He asked.

Tony didn’t reply for a minute, and Peter could feel his gaze on him. "‘Course, Pete. May said your curfew’s eleven."

"But?" Peter turned his head slightly to meet Tony’s eyes.

"You look like shit."

"I didn’t go out last night," he said. "I need to."

"I’m not gonna stop you." Tony took another sip from his mug and his face scrunched up again. "Just get some sleep when you get back, okay?"

As he crawled back into his bedroom window at exactly eleven, he kind of wished Tony hadn’t let him go out. His bones ached with exhaustion, bruises coloured his arms and his torso. He barely had the energy to slip out of his suit and shrug on a sweater, before collapsing into his bed.

"Can you tell Mister Stark I’m home?" He mumbled to F.R.I.D.A.Y.

His eyes slid shut when she said _of course_ and dimmed the lights, and he inhaled slowly, let it out through his nose. He waited. And waited.

Pins and needles crawled up his arm. The back of his head itched. He had a test tomorrow and an assignment due in on Monday. He had almost gotten shot on patrol. His bruises were pulsing and throbbing, healing quickly but not quick enough, and he snapped his eyes open and grabbed his phone.

Four-fifty-eight flashed back at him. When he pulled himself out of bed a few minutes later, into the shower, he slid down and curled into himself, and let the boiling water fall onto his back.

 

He knew he was heading for breakdown territory. His hands almost shook too much to write with, his eyes blurred and his vision faded in and out. His head pounded, and he must have looked so bad that MJ didn’t even bother him in decathlon; she just let him put his head down on the table and fall into an almost-sleep trance.

"Kid." Peter’s eyes kept on sliding shut. "Peter. _Peter._ "

"Hm?" He started, scrambling up.

Tony stood at the end of the couch, arms crossed. "Dinner? What do you want?"

Peter felt squeamish at the thought. "Uh… I don’t… really care."

"Right." Tony raised an eyebrow. "So my _rich people food_ will be fine?"

He pressed the heals of his palms against his eyes for a moment and yawned. "Sure."

Peter didn’t need to look to see Tony shaking his head and rolling his eyes.

 

He was in bed by nine o’clock. There was an empty cup of tea on his bedside table, a warm comforter around him. He had his softest sweatpants on and an even softer t-shirt on, which he was pretty sure had been Tony’s at some point.

Peter was so ready for sleep. But he supposed, as he laid dead still, staring at the roof in the dark, that the universe hated him. His watch was ticking. And ticking. And ticking.

And he punched the bed and shoved it in the beside table’s drawer and slammed it closed.

He was so fucking tired.

His heart was definitely speeding up, too. Seconds were ticking by, and his eyes wouldn’t close and his chest rose faster and faster. What if he was stuck? What if something had gone wrong with his spider DNA? Spiders didn’t sleep — at least not like humans. What if the spider part of him refused to let him sleep, but the human part of him kept on needing it?

He couldn’t breath. The sheets were too hot and heavy and the twisted and curled around him, and he kicked them off and stumbled away.

His brain hadn’t caught up with his body, apparently, because he was out of his room before he could think, walking down the silent halls and shivering in the cold air until his hand was frozen against a door handle. Tony’s door handle.

It was very silent for a few seconds, the sound only broken by his thudding heart. Peter was frozen, blinking.

He couldn’t make himself open it. He was a teenager, not a baby. He needed to suck it up, and maybe get knocked unconscious on patrol so he could get some rest.

" _Boss says that continuing to stand there for another minute will officially make it creepy._ "

His hand jumped off the handle as though it had somehow turned burning hot.

" _He also says that you are welcome to come in, Peter,_ " F.R.I.D.A.Y. said pleasantly.

Peter swallowed and let out a breath, before stealing himself and opening the door. Tony was leaning against the headboard casually, the light from his phone illuminating his eyes as they scanned him over.

"If you were tryin’ to sneak out, I think you missed the exit," Tony said, smirking slightly.

The nervousness fluttering in Peter disappeared, just a bit. "Whoops."

"What’re you doing up, Pete?" He asked casually, putting his phone down.

Then it came flooding back in and he felt ridiculously close to crying.

"I haven’t slept in three days." He wanted to laugh at himself, really. He knew he was being stupid, and maybe a bit dramatic, but tears were welling in his eyes and his hands were shaking. Tony stared at him for a moment, eyebrows furrowed.

And then something in his face softened. "Come here, kid."

His legs listened before he had even registered the words. Peter sat leaning on the headboard like Tony and hugged his knees.

"What’s going on?" Tony asked softly. When he put a hand on the back his neck, Peter leaned into it and shut his eyes.

"I just — can’t sleep," he said, voice heavy and croaky and cracking. "I don’t know — something’s wrong with me."

The hand on his neck squeezed gently. "Come on."

Tony shifted so he was laying, and Peter let himself be pulled down, let his head fall onto Tony’s shoulder. The TV flickered on, dimmed and almost silent.

"Stop trying to fall asleep." The channel turned, started playing old reruns of The Office. "Just relax, okay?"

Peter nodded slightly, felt Tony move slightly and a blanket fall over his shoulders and fingers start running through his hair.

"‘m sorry," he mumbled into Tony’s shirt.

"For what?"

"Keeping you up." A huff left Tony’s chest, and the fingers gently worked through a knot near the base of his neck.

"Kid?" Tony waited until he hummed a response. "Shut up."

He smiled, just a bit, and started watching the screen lazily, let the world disappear. His head moved up and down with Tony’s slow breaths, and he listened to his heartbeat. It was steady, and almost as soothing as the fingers gently running through his hair.

Something peaceful and warm and happy spread through his chest, and his eyes fluttered shut.

 

Later, when consciousness stirred, he peaked his eyes open. Outside, the clouds were grey and low, and rain pattered on the windows quietly. Tony was speaking softly on the phone, and he could feel Tony’s chest vibrate beneath his head with every word. Fingers were still combing through his hair. He fell back asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> um yeah i saw endgame and am dead inside so i needed irondad fluff  
> i saw it once with my sister and once with some friends and now im seeing it on saturday with another one of my mates (but in 4D so thats actually gonna be pretty cool) and i don't even know if i liked it or not whoops
> 
> i hope this cheers you guys up a lil bit <3


End file.
